Honoring Texas Confederate General August C. Buchel

Carl August Buchel, born on October 8, 1813, in Guntersblum, Hesse, dropped the umlaut from Büchel in Texas. He entered the Darmstadt military academy at fourteen and held a commission at eighteen. In Spain, Queen Maria Christina knighted him in 1838 for bravery at Huesca, and in Turkey he refused a general's rank that required converting to Islam. He reached Carlshafen, later Indianola, in 1845. The Handbook of Texas calls him a colonel and dates his death after Pleasant Hill April 15, 1864, though an official report says April 11. He fought for a government built on slavery.

What the plaque says

Honoring Texas Confederate General August C. Buchel 1811-1864 Educated in stern military schools of Prussia. Was in French Legion and army of Turkey. Knighted in Spain after work in Carlist wars. Came to Texas 1845. In Mexican War 1846-47. Later became Port of Lavaca customs collector. Commanded Confederates at Brownsville, 1862-63. In charge of roads exporting cotton, beef, importing corn, munitions, medicines and factory goods thru Mexico. Foreign ships waited beyond territorial waters. Their goods were exchanged for Confederate cotton, hauled to them by small boats. Goods then came north, via Buchel post. Buchel's regiment, 1st Texas cavalry, in 1863 was organized with nucleus from 1st Texas Mounted Rifles. In Buchel's regiment were Taylor's Texas Riflemen of DeWitt County. 1863-64 Buchel had a great role in Texas coastal defense, most dramatic chapter in Confederate history. In command of Sabine District, Buchel harried Federal blockade fleet with infantry, cavalry. One Buchel duty was to protect blockade-runners. Also handled prize ships. He held Niblett's Bluff, La., when 20,000 Federals with much artillery tried a breakthrough to Texas there, Oct. - Nov., 1863. Jan. 1864 defended Caney's Bayou, Tex., from Federal gunboat attack. During 1864 Red River Campaign to save Texas from invasion, Buchel's regiment at Pleasant Hill, La. routed a Federal ambush. Buchel fell of mortal wounds and died two days later - "An irreparable loss to his country". Buried in Texas State Cemetery, Austin. Erected by the State of Texas 1964

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Chisholm Trail Heritage Museum — steps away
  A cattle-country museum in Cuero's 1903 Knights of Pythias Hall, telling the Guadalupe Valley's 1866 drive north and the Sutton-Taylor feud that bloodied DeWitt County.
• Spoetzl Brewery — 25 mi
  The brewery a Czech and German railroad town started in a tin shed in 1909, run through Prohibition by a Bavarian who had brewed in Cairo, and then by his daughter.
• De León Plaza — 26 mi
  The central plaza of Guadalupe Victoria, the only predominantly Mexican colony in Texas, founded by Martín De León in 1824 and taken from his family after 1836.
• Museum of the Coastal Bend — 27 mi
  Victoria College's museum of thirteen thousand years on the middle Texas coast, from Clovis hunters and Karankawa potters to La Salle's lost Fort St. Louis and the first ranches.

More markers nearby

• James Norman Smith — steps away
• St. Mark's Lutheran Church — steps away
• St. Michael's Catholic Church — steps away
• World War II Air Training School Brayton Flying Field — steps away